Extraordinary October. Diana Wagman

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СКАЧАТЬ Two Days Until My Birthday

      I was exhausted the next morning. I’d been frightened driving home and then running up my front walk and even inside my house. I checked under my bed and, after arming myself with my ancient red Elmo flashlight, looked inside the closet. I thought I was too old to be afraid of the dark, but that night all the terrors of my childhood came flooding back. Monsters, witches, vampires, and psycho murderers. I put a chair in front of the closet door and I kept the flashlight in bed beside me. Where was Luisa, my brain went round and round, where could she be and how could it be my fault? It wasn’t. It wasn’t. That voice was just my imagination saying the worst thing possible. The same too big imagination that pretended I could understand crows and cactus wrens and fireflies. I finally fell asleep just as the sun was coming up, a solid, heavy sleep without dreams. My alarm went off an hour later and I woke up stiff, my eyes puffy and my mouth dry. I wasn’t itching, but the bruise on my ankle had blossomed into a stylized kind of flower. I must have been scratching in my sleep because the red lines were dark blue like bruises and radiated from the flower shape, circling my calf. I definitely needed to wear my jeans to cover it up. Not that I ever wore skirts.

      When I plodded into the kitchen, Dad was making his favorite banana pancakes. It seemed he was back to his old, chipper self.

      “Morning. You look like you could use another couple of hours.”

      “Don’t worry,” I said. “I can nap in English.”

      “Don’t get cocky, Miss College Co-ed. English is still important. If you’re going to sleep, do it in Biology.”

      He laughed, of course, but for once I didn’t, and he looked at me with concern.

      “What’s up, Pumpkin? Bad dreams?”

      “Luisa’s missing.” I blurted it out. “Even Jed doesn’t know where she is.”

      My dad swayed as if someone had hit him. He held onto the counter.

      “What? Are you okay?”

      He turned to me, and his smile was big and fake. “They’ll find her. Not your problem. Don’t worry.”

      But his eyes were saying something different. He looked worried. And scared.

      “What’s going on with you?” I asked.

      He put a pancake on a plate and handed it to me. He sounded like himself when he laughed. “You know what they say: Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” He looked at me and waited.

      “All day,” I responded. It was our standard joke—something I had said when I was a little kid and tried to justify eating banana pancakes at every meal—but again I didn’t laugh. I wasn’t even hungry. “Where’s Mom?”

      “She left early. Said she had another conference.”

      “What? She has to get back in time for my birthday.”

      “Two more days.” Dad studied me for a moment. “How are you feeling?”

      “Fine. Fine. Just tired.”

      “Sit down. Eat your breakfast. I’ll drive you to school.”

      “Okay, thanks.” Getting a ride sounded great.

      The syrup and butter were on the table, but I liked my pancakes plain. I picked it up with my fingers. That was another thing that would usually drive my dad crazy: I liked to eat pancakes with my hands. That morning he didn’t seem to notice. I watched him cooking. Usually it was one pancake for me and three for him. One for Mom and two more for him. He had one sitting on a plate on the counter beside the stove, but he hadn’t touched it.

      “Delicious, Dad. Have you had one?”

      “Got one right here.” He gestured to the uneaten pancake. “Yummy.”

      I watched him until it was time to leave and he never ate one bite. Something was definitely different about him. I wondered if hypnotism could make a person starve to death. I wondered if a fat person could live longer without food than a skinny person? Mr. Snyder, the bio teacher, loved it when we came in with practical questions. I would ask him, I thought—if I was awake. Ha ha ha.

      Dad tried to cheer me up the whole way to school. He told a string of terrible jokes continuing right up to when he dropped me off. “Hope you remembered your lunch,” he said. “You know what’s the worst thing in the school cafeteria?”

      “What?”

      “The food!” He was howling with laughter as he drove away.

      I was glad I’d told him I’d take the bus home. I couldn’t take his cheerfulness. Not that morning, not that day. It didn’t seem fair that it was an absolutely beautiful spring day. The sun was warm, the air was soft, the grass in front of the school looked incredibly, shockingly green. How could it be so beautiful out when Luisa was missing and I was hearing voices, possibly losing my mind. Where were the clouds, the ominous sky? It wasn’t right to see kids laughing and taking off their jackets and chasing each other around like kindergarteners. I sat on a bench with my head down, waiting for the bell to ring. Someone sat down beside me. I smelled flowers and sure enough, when I looked up, it was Walker.

      “What are you doing here?” I asked. “Didn’t you hear? Luisa is missing.”

      He reached for my hand, but I slid away from him. “Two days until you’re eighteen.”

      “So what? Tell me about Hayden College. What’s the campus like? Who’s your favorite teacher?”

      “Well…” he began and stopped.

      “Do you even actually go to college?”

      “I’m here because…” He stopped again. “Listen. You can’t worry about Luisa.”

      I picked up my backpack and stood to go into school, but he took my hand and just like the first time, I felt it all the way up my spine. My muscles went loose and I had to sit back down. “Walker.”

      “October. Please. Stay away from that new kid. That Trevor. And don’t look for Luisa. Sometimes you have to sacrifice the one for the good of the many.”

      “You’re crazy. That doesn’t apply here. It doesn’t.”

      But for the first time there were clouds in his blue sky eyes. There was something he wasn’t telling me. I stood up again. Touch or no touch, warm, cozy feeling or not, I was out of there.

      “Wait,” Walker said. “I’m sorry. Sorry. Jed told me Luisa’s with her father.”

      “Her mother doesn’t think so.”

      He frowned, swallowed hard. For once I knew something he didn’t. “When did you talk to her?”

      “Last night—actually very early this morning. I went over to Luisa’s. Her mother’s really scared. She thought I might know where Luisa is. Why would she think that? Plus I found Luisa’s favorite Frisbee in front of my house. Something is going on and it seems I’m involved whether I like it or not.”

      “You’re СКАЧАТЬ